Board backs honor society's projects

Thursday

Nov 14, 2013 at 12:01 AM

Kortny Hahn

The Wolverine Community Schools Board of Education approved a $500 donation to the school's National Honor Society, NHS, to help fund its annual dinner and several other projects.
NHS member Courtney Ogden told the board the money would go toward paying honor society monthly dues as well as funding several community service projects.
“You guys could help support us in helping to make the community a better place,” Ogden said.
She outlined several projects the NHS is involved in, including penny wars to buy hearts to send to troops overseas and a Quiz Bowl held to raise donations for St. Jude's Children's Hospital.
“We also work with Adopt-A-Highway to keep our highways clean,” she said. “We try to be constant roll models in the school.”
They also put together Easter and Thanksgiving baskets for families who are in need during the holidays.
“They are for families who cannot necessarily get everything they need together to have a Thanksgiving dinner,” she said.
Ogden said the goal of NHS projects is to help promote student-staff relationships and have a good time, while raising money for good causes.
“It gets the whole school involved and everyone has a great time with it,” she said.
According to Ogden, to be a member of the National Honor Society, a student has to have a cumulative grade point average of at least 3.0, go above and beyond the duties of a normal student and work at least 20 hours of community service. They also must have demonstrated integrity.
In other action at Monday's meeting, superintendant Joe Hart informed the board that the school had been approved for a $20,000 grant to be used toward security equipment for both school buildings.
The money has to flow through the Cheboygan County Sheriff's Department, so he was uncertain of an exact timetable when the funds would be available, but was hoping to start installation over Christmas break.
“It would be great if they could get in and install the equipment during Christmas when there are no students in the building,” Hart said.
Hart also told the board that during a recent meeting with the Maintenance and Grounds Committee, a list was made of building maintenance needs.
At the top of the list was getting the remaining boilers fixed for the heating system.
“The three that are running are running fine,” Hart said. “We are working on getting the fourth boiler fixed.”
Board president David Ashenfelter said the heating system can work properly with only one boiler.
The second project on the list was getting a new sound system in place in the gymnasium, with the annual Christmas program coming up in less than a month.
The program will be held Tuesday, Dec. 17, at 6:30 p.m. In the event of a snow day, it would be made up the following evening.
“We have our Christmas program coming up and it would be ideal to have something in place for that,” Hart said.
Ashenfelter said he believes the new sound system would be a good thing. The current system being used was purchased in 2000.
“Let's get prices, let's get going on that,” he said.
At the meeting, elementary principal Stephen Seelye commented on the breakfast held at the elementary school Monday morning for veterans, saying it was a nice event and a great thing for the community.
He also told the board about his “All As” reward program, where he takes students who work very hard and get all As on their report card to the Thirsty Sturgeon for lunch. Last time he took a group, eight students were able to accompany him.
He said he intends to continue with the program, in an attempt to motivate students to do well and work their hardest. This is one of several programs Seelye has put into place, including letting students on the honor roll dip their hands in paint and leave their handprints on the wall in the multi-purpose room.
“It's motivating, you know,” Seelye said. “Little motivations. Little motivations are nice for the students.”
Seelye told the board he recently had a small group of people come in from Pellston Public Schools and talk to him about several different rewards programs they are using to motivate students.
According to Seelye, there are several things Pellston is doing that are very similar to what Wolverine Community Schools is doing. However, there are several other things he thought were interesting, that haven't been implemented yet.
“We're constantly trying to change for the better,” Seelye said.
He also stated he thinks the time spent with the people from Pellston was time well spent, as it was nice to have someone come in and show real world experience of how the motivation programs work. He continues to go to conferences and look for new ways to continue improving the school in a positive way.
“It's been a very good month,” he said.